Mound Valley, Kansas, sits in USDA hardiness zone 7a — a zone band wide enough that plant choice, not possibility, is the interesting question.
A short list that earns its place here — cabbage, hazelnut, california poppy, and collard greens — with any one site's soil, sun, and drainage making the final cut.
Even in Mound Valley, no two yards are alike.
A low spot, a south-facing slope, or a stand of trees moves the frost date and sun across a single Mound Valley lot. Enter your address and we'll score 1,086 plants against your land's actual soil, sun, and frost.
We read public map data around Mound Valley — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Mound Valley — the short answer
Mound Valley, Kansas: USDA zone 7a, about 220 days between hard freezes, across 411 acres of city.
- USDA zone
- 7a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 30
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 5
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~220
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- City area
- 411 acres
- US Census TIGER/Line 2025
Every figure names the dataset it came from. Hard-freeze dates are this town’s own 28°F normals: light frosts run a few weeks past them, and tender transplants usually wait 2–3 weeks after the last hard freeze.
Hardiness Zone Range
Zone 7a is Mound Valley's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Mound Valley's 220-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Mound Valley
Each reading below is measured for Mound Valley itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredMound Valley runs about 220 days between hard freezes — a long growing season.
There is slack for succession plantings and slow-finishing crops: many vegetables can be sown twice, and the heat-lovers have time to ripen fully.
Plan a second sowing of quick crops after the first comes out, and use the fall window most gardeners let sit idle.
NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
Winter hardiness
MeasuredMound Valley sits in USDA hardiness zone 7a.
The zone sets which perennials, shrubs, and fruit trees live through an average winter here — a plant rated for a colder zone is a safe bet, one rated warmer needs winter protection or gets treated as an annual.
Match perennials and fruit to the zone before you buy, so nothing you plant is a gamble against the cold.
USDA PHZM 2023
The kind of country Mound Valley is in
Mound Valley sits in the Central Irregular Plains — EPA Level III, inside the wider Great Plains. That is read at Mound Valley's own centroid rather than borrowed from Labette County.
What Grows in Mound Valley
Every plant below cleared Mound Valley's own zone 7a and its 220-day season. Each card opens that plant's Kansas profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Mound Valley?
For most of the year, no — what changes is which crops still fit the days remaining. Cool-season crops can go in from around Mar 2; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 30 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 5 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. With a season this long, “too late” mostly means “switch crops” — second sowings and a full fall garden are the norm, with garlic closing the year.
What's on the federal record near Mound Valley
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Mound Valley. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- MOUND VALLEY GROCERYUnderground Storage Tanks · 500 ft
- MERIDIAN ANALYTICAL LABS, LLCBrownfields · 500 ft
- TRINITY ANALYTICAL LABBrownfields · 500 ft
- LABETTE CO, HWY DEPTUnderground Storage Tanks · 650 ft
- USD #506 MOUND VALLEY GRADE SCUnderground Storage Tanks · 1000 ft
- BELINDA'SUnderground Storage Tanks · 1600 ft
- TRINITY ENVIRONMENTAL TECHNOLBrownfields · 2500 ft
- 33S 18E 10BB 01Nitrate · 1.6 mi
- 33S 18E 10BBB 01Nitrate · 1.6 mi
- 32S 19E 32BB 01Nitrate · 2.9 mi
- 33S 18E 23BB 01Nitrate · 3.0 mi
- 33S 18E 08CC 01Nitrate · 3.7 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Mound Valley's center, not your beds. Run your own address for what's upwind of you specifically.
Environmental Intelligence
The counts behind that headline — every source type on the record near Mound Valley.
Total Sites
115
within ~10 miles of Mound Valley
Risk Level
Moderate
Highest-severity
1 Toxics Release Inventory facility
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Mound Valley
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Mound Valley
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Mound Valley, Nitrate runs higher than the national average — 74 sites within ~10 miles of Mound Valley. That's not a problem with your land — it's information about it.
Nitrate: Nitrate contamination primarily comes from agricultural fertilizer runoff and failing septic systems.
Test well water for nitrate if you rely on a private well for irrigation (EPA standard: 10 mg/L).
Check your specific parcel in Mound Valley
Get exact proximity distances to contamination sources for your specific parcel — plus soil, sun, drainage, and 1,086 plant recommendations.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Mound Valley average
Your land is one point inside Mound Valley
Everything above resolves to Mound Valley as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 411 acres. Your parcel is one point inside that footprint. Slope, tree cover, a low spot that pools cold air, and what is in the soil are all resolved at the address, and none of them are visible at city scale. That is the honest boundary of this page, and the reason the next step is a reading of your own ground rather than a better local average.
Your Lot vs the Mound Valley Average
Mound Valley Average
- ●USDA Zones 7a, averaged across Mound Valley
- ●One soil character for all of Mound Valley
- ●Frost dates read at Mound Valley's scale: Mar 30 to Nov 5
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Mound Valley's 7a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Mound Valley
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Mound Valley, Kansas — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Mound Valley averages can't show:
We read public map data around Mound Valley — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Mound Valley average
How we know this about Mound Valley
The datasets: hardiness from the USDA ARS Plant Hardiness Zone Map 2023, read at this city’s own centroid; hard-freeze dates from NOAA 1991–2020 28°F normals at Mound Valley’s own record; boundaries and acreage from US Census TIGER/Line 2025; the contamination records from the federal sources named in their beats above. Soil is not read at city grain anywhere on this page — there is no city-resolution survey in our data, which is why you will find no soil grid here rather than a statewide one wearing a local label. The resolution ledger below names every figure this page inherited.
Common questions about Mound Valley
When does frost risk typically end in Mound Valley?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Mound Valley typically lands around Mar 30, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — earlier than the light-frost dates most charts quote. That marks the hard freeze, not the last light frost — lighter frosts keep biting past it, which is why tender transplants here wait until about Apr 20.
When is the first frost in Mound Valley?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Mound Valley typically arrives around Nov 5, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 22, so the watching starts about Oct 6 — about 220 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Mound Valley?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Mound Valley sees about 220 frost-free days — roughly Mar 30 through Nov 5, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 20 to Oct 22, about 185 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Mound Valley?
The federal record around Mound Valley shows 115 documented sites, mostly Nitrate entries (74), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record under a tenth of a mile out — a typical footprint for a growing area, and proximity to a documented site is information, not a diagnosis of any one yard. It's worth seeing which recorded sites sit closest to where you grow, and testing the soil before new food beds near any of them.
How do I protect my plants from frost in Mound Valley?
From about Oct 6 the job here turns from planting to protecting — the last start even a 30-day crop can finish. As the season closes around the first 28°F hard freeze near Nov 5 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals), three moves buy time: row cover or an old sheet over tender plants on still, clear nights; water the soil the afternoon before a freeze, so it holds warmth overnight; and harvest tomatoes, peppers and basil before Nov 5. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Mound Valley's scale — its 7a band and its 220-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Mound Valley's numbers: we read soil, sun, drainage and frost at your exact address. Try it for 14 days — no card required.
What this page reads at Mound Valley’s own scale
6 of the readings below were taken at Mound Valley's own scale — its own ~220-day season between 28°F freezes, the 411 acres it covers and 115 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Mound Valley's own USDA hardiness band, zones 7aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Mound Valley's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Mar 30 and Nov 5 and the ~220-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 115 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Mound Valley, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record under a tenth of a mile out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Mound Valley's boundary and the 411 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 7a and a ~220-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Mound Valley's own centroid, the Central Irregular PlainsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Mound Valley's 411 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Labette County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Labette County
- The growing challenges every Kansas grower plans around — written at state scale, so they stay on the state guidefrom Kansas
- Butterfly and beetle records, and the farmland pesticide estimate — all published county-widefrom Labette County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Mound Valley's 411 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Mound Valley you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 411 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record under a tenth of a mile out, measured from the town centrehow we read the record →
- Where cold air settles, which slopes face the sun, and which way the wind runs on your own ground — measured at your address, and averaged away by any Mound Valley-wide figureread your own land →